Yes to all of this. I told my 75-year old Mother and 73-year old Aunt on Tuesday night: as long as we keep doing the work of talking to friends and neighbors and community members, asking if they are registered to vote, encouraging them to vote, and doing the hard work of making sure everyone can get to the polls, then we will win. I've been saying for a year now that women will be the difference makers. WE ARE NOT GOING BACK.
I saw a recent poll - NYT? - showing Harris favorability crossing the 50% mark, whilst tRump's remains in the low 40s, and stagnant. Also, Josh Marshall had a chat with old-school pollster and political analyst Stuart Rothenberg, who was quoted as saying that it very well could be an EV rout for the Dem ticket. And Jeff Tiedrich today has some very interesting insights from data scientist Thomas Miller, who relies on the betting markets as being more in tune with voter sentiment than laggy polls, and where the largest, PredictIt, also is aligning toward an EV stomping by Harris-Walz.
I know, I know, we were all burned in 2016, nobody listened to Nate Silver, yadda-yadda, but THIS TIME IT FEELS DIFFERENT!
Everybody has reported that 400,000 new voter registrations in 24 hours but nobody's taken a longer snapshot of the number since Taylor came out with her announcement. I have no idea how to research that if you can, that would be great.
"His [Trump's} most solid support came from older white voters in those states, but many of them have since passed away, either from Covid or from other causes." Being a 72 year old Boomer I can also add that women outlive men, and female Boomers remember the days before Roe, and are very pissed off about the Dobbs decision and what's happening to women in Red states with anti-women abortion bans. According to JD Vance, I'm evil (retired university professor), somehow I'm running the country but doing a horrible job of it as a single cat lady, and because my daughter and her partner do not yet have any children I'm also a post-menopausal worthless woman. Female boomers have lived their lives living through sexual assault, sexual discrimination, misogyny and constant insults. We've had enough and we aren't going back.
At almost 82 I'm too old to be a boomer. But I sure do remember the time when women had to fight for any independence. We are not going back and neither are our granddaughters!
I’m 84, even older than boomers, and my friends and I had our children prior to the Roe decision. Back then, pregnancy was a scary proposition. Abortions weren’t available, and there were so many conditions that are now handled medically with much better outcomes.
All of us want our granddaughters to have the same rights their mothers had. We are voting for Kamala and Tim. We are not going back!
I am especially hopeful that J.D. Vance is alienating more and more people (read: independents and whoever the eff those few "undecideds" still are) by the hour...And that Trump will never forgive Don Jr. and Eric for strong-arming him into picking Vance! I think there should be a drinking game for every time someone says either Trump or Vance "doubled down" on whatever horrible thing they have said...they simply are NEVER WRONG and will NEVER APOLOGIZE! I simply don't understand why every single American is not tired of his clown show!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I only play drinking games that seem likely to leave me with a pleasant buzz. I achieved near-alcohol-poisoning more than once in my youth, and I am definitely over it. That one seems like it's get me there...
Yes, Patricia! I'm almost 78 and I'm really pissed about the mistreatment, the cruelty to women and marginalized people that Repubithugs exemplify! I do have 2 adult children, but I'm postmenopausal and have a cat. 😤💙🌊💙🌊💙🌊
It's interesting to note that VP Harris has cracked the 50% mark on numerous recent polls, but Donald Trump never has. Does that mean he's reached his ceiling? Sure seems that way. Are the latest KNOWING Trump/Vance lies about Haitian immigrants designed to get low propensity MAGA leaners to turn out? Again, sure seems that way. Seems that the Trump campaign has given up on expanding their reach and instead is digging into the lower reaches of the MAGA cesspool.
Speaking of extremists on the ballot, there's A LOT of buzz here in NC that something big is about to drop on Mark Robinson which could cause him to withdraw from the governor's race. Given how vile he's been the socials for years, it's hard to imagine what could be bad enough to drive him from the race, but apparently CNN has a big story coming out on him. That would throw the entirety of the NC race, top to bottom, into utter turmoil for the republicans and help the Harris campaign's chances. *Cheshire Cat grin.....*
I believe he reached his popular vote ceiling. He will need an EC vote win through a favorable distribution of those votes. That begins and ends in PA.
I still think there is room to move on the Women gap. I hope/think that southern (‘republican’) ladies are starting to hear the stories of young women dying of these abortion bans and may just find a reason to go to the polls this year without hubby. Young and black women may show the rethuglicans a thing or 2 as well. Nobody looks at southern LBGTQ+ voters, but we are motivated as well.
He has NO redeeming qualities. None. He and his wife ran a shockingly bad day care center, and lied about doing background checks on their employees. Then they defrauded the state and federal government with another business that was supposed to provide food for low-income kids. He and his family have made a career out of getting rich off of CHILDREN. It doesn't get much lower than that.
And the rethug for secretary of education in NC is a nazi as well. Add Kamala and abortion into the mix and this might be a perfect storm in NC. They are still gerrymandered to the hilt, but that has no effect on national or statewide races.
100%! If anyone is unfamiliar with this guy, do yourself a favor and google him. He is exactly as you describe and probably worse if you dig deeper. Thanks for sharing.
News flash for Mark Robinson: He's out, one way or the other. The stuff that CNN revealed is just more graphic and loathsome than the things he's been willing to put his name on publicly. He's simply a vile human being. There are few people who have no redeeming qualities, but he's one. Along with Trump.
I haven’t read the CNN article but the threads about him on BlueSky are gross. Was there a volcano full of dinosaur poo somewhere that shot him out onto the earth?
Great summation. I've been on the optimist train since just before the convention when I saw how crazy fast her coalition coalesced (sorry, couldn't help myself there).
My only request of Prosecutor Harris is that if she is elected, please remember that she doesn't owe anything to those 111 Republican security officials for being grown ups.
…” that the vortex will close in on itself, and we can finally, collectively, exhale.” Yes! And i am glad for these walk through’s of sane reasoning. post-political trauma and the glimpse of rational thought, even knowing it can be fleet, is balm for the collective psyche. Vote. Vote. Vote.
Another reason to be cautiously optimistic that popped up after Jay wrote this:
Robinson, running for governor of NC, apparently has yet another skeleton in the closet that CNN is apparently going to drop today. What on earth could be worse than he has already had plastered across the TV screens, his addiction to porn, saying women shouldn't be allowed to vote, that women need to control what is below their belly button but not men, that he regards himself as a Nazi, on and on and on, none of it bothered MAGA? The news is apparently so ghastly Republican Party of NC is urging him to drop out today, which is the last day to withdraw. They cannot get him off the ballot, regardless, because that deadline passed.
My guess would be that they would be begging people to write in a particular name. They might have some sort of caucus to arrive at that name, but I don't know of another route.
I'm hoping that the people across the country are taking the vile racism and lies seriously and understanding that the GQP scumwads are showing their true colors and need to be VOTED OUT.
Cheetolini and CouchF*ck McGee (Jeff T's name for him) need to be called out for their cowardly domestic terrorism and mocked for avoiding discussion of anything of substance. The Haitian communities in places like Florida will hopefully be motivated to turn out to vote in massive numbers and vote not only for Harris/Walz, but for the rest of the Dems all the way down the ballot.
A remarkable piece because it could easily be 10 separate posts, and it has astonishingly little repetition. Expertly done. Optimism, yes. I am very optimistic. But as we soccer fans say, "two-nil is the most dangerous lead in sports." Staying disciplined and diligent will win the game.
I feel like we need Gold Five in our ears saying "stay on target... stay on target..."
I always get annoyed when people bring out that old chestnut about which candidate you’d want to have a beer with, but there might be something to it this time, because part of what makes Harris and Walz appealing is that they seem NORMAL. We are so, so tired of the MAGA weirdness, of people carrying fake sperm in cups and talking about foreigners eating our pets and screaming about drag queens and all the rest of it. Harris and Walz have identifiable facial expressions; they can make friendly jokes; I can imagine asking one of them for directions. We have been wandering in the desert for nine years and these totally ordinary human qualities are like a pool of clear water. Normality, decency, competence: I want to jump into them and paddle around.
Its only the polls saying that its a close race. I don't think its close at all and suspect Harris will win by a large landslide, along with several other Democrats in what the polls are calling"tight" races.
I suspect Big media and their Billionaire owners are promoting a false narrative that the race is tight (and sometimes even that Trump is leading like they were a few weeks ago) in an attempt to "fair and balance" the corporate tax cutters into victory. I simply refuse to believe these polls, period.
Its the Turnout, Stupid. All of the registered voters especially the ones who are of the Taylor Swift crowd will make a huge difference. Also, they are not going to buy into October Surprises such as possible laptop emails and other bullshit. If anything, the October surprise will be Trump's sudden incarceration or the news that he and Laura Loomer are expecting.
Elan Musk can go eff himself as everyone recognizes that he is a James Bond -class villain. His Starlink Satellites are burning up and spreading fine alumina dust in the same atmospheric layers where protective Ozone is created. This dust is reducing the Ozone so lather up in sunscreen everyone. Unfortunately, the trees and other organisms cannot do this and this is further stressing the satellites. He is simply launching these satellites to justify the privatization of Space. Wear your sunscreen everyone and kiss the Biosphere goodbye.
Hopefully he and Trump will launch off to Mars soon, or go down to the Titanic in a fiberglass submarine. And there is that saying: Third time's a Charm.
Sigh. There’s more than a single issue in this election.
Do you honestly think a second Trump administration would be better for the innocents in Gaza? Trump, who finds a corrupt “partner” in Netanyahu, would do *anything* Bibi asked him to do, and I can *guarantee* you that would not be good for Palestinian civilians, who are unfortunately bearing the brunt of Israel’s attacks of claimed self-defense.
Just like Trump running to stay out of prison, Netanyahu is maintaining the “war efforts” as a way to deflect from his own felonious conduct. A Trump presidency would give Bibi everything he needs to maintain that war and stay out of prison himself.
I find it hard to believe that you can’t see this clearly.
It seems everyone is forgetting Taylor Swift’s first encouragement to vote. I’m not sure of the exact number, but it was around 367,000 new registrations. Add that to the 406,000 this round and you get almost 800,000 new voters. That enough to swing the election in Harris’ favor. In addition, Billie Eilish has also encouraged her fans to register and vote. Not only are a majority of these new voters young women, they are likely to vote for Harris because of reproductive rights and climate change, which will impact their lives more than any other issue.
Altogether, unless something major occurs (pray God it doesn’t), it’s looking very good for the Harris/Walz ticket.
Yes to all of this. I told my 75-year old Mother and 73-year old Aunt on Tuesday night: as long as we keep doing the work of talking to friends and neighbors and community members, asking if they are registered to vote, encouraging them to vote, and doing the hard work of making sure everyone can get to the polls, then we will win. I've been saying for a year now that women will be the difference makers. WE ARE NOT GOING BACK.
No we aren’t!
👏
Well Harris won't get the 40 Texas electoral votes..but I'm hopeful that maybe Colin Allred can slip in there and defeat Cruz. Maybe.
fingers crossed for Allred (when not furiously writing post cards and text banking ;) )
From your lips to God’s ears!
Wouldn’t it be a joyful day if she did? Of course MAGA would lose their ever loving mind!
I saw a recent poll - NYT? - showing Harris favorability crossing the 50% mark, whilst tRump's remains in the low 40s, and stagnant. Also, Josh Marshall had a chat with old-school pollster and political analyst Stuart Rothenberg, who was quoted as saying that it very well could be an EV rout for the Dem ticket. And Jeff Tiedrich today has some very interesting insights from data scientist Thomas Miller, who relies on the betting markets as being more in tune with voter sentiment than laggy polls, and where the largest, PredictIt, also is aligning toward an EV stomping by Harris-Walz.
I know, I know, we were all burned in 2016, nobody listened to Nate Silver, yadda-yadda, but THIS TIME IT FEELS DIFFERENT!
There are so many reasons to believe that it IS different this time.
Nevermind...just figured it out (early voting right?)
See above.
Everybody has reported that 400,000 new voter registrations in 24 hours but nobody's taken a longer snapshot of the number since Taylor came out with her announcement. I have no idea how to research that if you can, that would be great.
It was all about the big bump. I would expect the numbers to have returned to whatever "normal" is for this.
What does EV mean?
Electoral Votes
OOPS...guessed wrong. Thank you!
I was wondering that myself. 😊✌🏻
"His [Trump's} most solid support came from older white voters in those states, but many of them have since passed away, either from Covid or from other causes." Being a 72 year old Boomer I can also add that women outlive men, and female Boomers remember the days before Roe, and are very pissed off about the Dobbs decision and what's happening to women in Red states with anti-women abortion bans. According to JD Vance, I'm evil (retired university professor), somehow I'm running the country but doing a horrible job of it as a single cat lady, and because my daughter and her partner do not yet have any children I'm also a post-menopausal worthless woman. Female boomers have lived their lives living through sexual assault, sexual discrimination, misogyny and constant insults. We've had enough and we aren't going back.
At almost 82 I'm too old to be a boomer. But I sure do remember the time when women had to fight for any independence. We are not going back and neither are our granddaughters!
I’m 84, even older than boomers, and my friends and I had our children prior to the Roe decision. Back then, pregnancy was a scary proposition. Abortions weren’t available, and there were so many conditions that are now handled medically with much better outcomes.
All of us want our granddaughters to have the same rights their mothers had. We are voting for Kamala and Tim. We are not going back!
I am especially hopeful that J.D. Vance is alienating more and more people (read: independents and whoever the eff those few "undecideds" still are) by the hour...And that Trump will never forgive Don Jr. and Eric for strong-arming him into picking Vance! I think there should be a drinking game for every time someone says either Trump or Vance "doubled down" on whatever horrible thing they have said...they simply are NEVER WRONG and will NEVER APOLOGIZE! I simply don't understand why every single American is not tired of his clown show!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I only play drinking games that seem likely to leave me with a pleasant buzz. I achieved near-alcohol-poisoning more than once in my youth, and I am definitely over it. That one seems like it's get me there...
Yes, Patricia! I'm almost 78 and I'm really pissed about the mistreatment, the cruelty to women and marginalized people that Repubithugs exemplify! I do have 2 adult children, but I'm postmenopausal and have a cat. 😤💙🌊💙🌊💙🌊
1 MIL likes!
It's interesting to note that VP Harris has cracked the 50% mark on numerous recent polls, but Donald Trump never has. Does that mean he's reached his ceiling? Sure seems that way. Are the latest KNOWING Trump/Vance lies about Haitian immigrants designed to get low propensity MAGA leaners to turn out? Again, sure seems that way. Seems that the Trump campaign has given up on expanding their reach and instead is digging into the lower reaches of the MAGA cesspool.
Speaking of extremists on the ballot, there's A LOT of buzz here in NC that something big is about to drop on Mark Robinson which could cause him to withdraw from the governor's race. Given how vile he's been the socials for years, it's hard to imagine what could be bad enough to drive him from the race, but apparently CNN has a big story coming out on him. That would throw the entirety of the NC race, top to bottom, into utter turmoil for the republicans and help the Harris campaign's chances. *Cheshire Cat grin.....*
Once again, thanks for the great analysis, Jay!
I believe he reached his popular vote ceiling. He will need an EC vote win through a favorable distribution of those votes. That begins and ends in PA.
Some pundits say if Trump loses NC, game over, there is no route for him to win. Is that true?
I still think there is room to move on the Women gap. I hope/think that southern (‘republican’) ladies are starting to hear the stories of young women dying of these abortion bans and may just find a reason to go to the polls this year without hubby. Young and black women may show the rethuglicans a thing or 2 as well. Nobody looks at southern LBGTQ+ voters, but we are motivated as well.
I cannot believe that North Carolinians would actually vote for Mark Robinson...he is VILE.
He has NO redeeming qualities. None. He and his wife ran a shockingly bad day care center, and lied about doing background checks on their employees. Then they defrauded the state and federal government with another business that was supposed to provide food for low-income kids. He and his family have made a career out of getting rich off of CHILDREN. It doesn't get much lower than that.
And the rethug for secretary of education in NC is a nazi as well. Add Kamala and abortion into the mix and this might be a perfect storm in NC. They are still gerrymandered to the hilt, but that has no effect on national or statewide races.
100%! If anyone is unfamiliar with this guy, do yourself a favor and google him. He is exactly as you describe and probably worse if you dig deeper. Thanks for sharing.
And....
The story is out! Lol.
And it's a doozy. He's saying he won't withdrawal. I'm assuming that's actually a good thing, but who knows.
He has til the end of day today to change his tiny little mind, according to state law.
I’ll be writing about this tomorrow in The Status Kuo…
You'll need a long shower when you're finished.
News flash for Mark Robinson: He's out, one way or the other. The stuff that CNN revealed is just more graphic and loathsome than the things he's been willing to put his name on publicly. He's simply a vile human being. There are few people who have no redeeming qualities, but he's one. Along with Trump.
I haven’t read the CNN article but the threads about him on BlueSky are gross. Was there a volcano full of dinosaur poo somewhere that shot him out onto the earth?
That's as good a theory as any. He's clearly a man with deep self-esteem and anger issues. He's got a chip on his shoulder as big as he is.
Re Mark R., the Republicans have asked him to drop out and he has refused.
ONLY because his polling is bad. NC republicans would be just fine with him if he was leading in the polls.
Great summation. I've been on the optimist train since just before the convention when I saw how crazy fast her coalition coalesced (sorry, couldn't help myself there).
My only request of Prosecutor Harris is that if she is elected, please remember that she doesn't owe anything to those 111 Republican security officials for being grown ups.
Thanks for the optimism. I’ve been feeling hopeful for awhile.
…” that the vortex will close in on itself, and we can finally, collectively, exhale.” Yes! And i am glad for these walk through’s of sane reasoning. post-political trauma and the glimpse of rational thought, even knowing it can be fleet, is balm for the collective psyche. Vote. Vote. Vote.
Another reason to be cautiously optimistic that popped up after Jay wrote this:
Robinson, running for governor of NC, apparently has yet another skeleton in the closet that CNN is apparently going to drop today. What on earth could be worse than he has already had plastered across the TV screens, his addiction to porn, saying women shouldn't be allowed to vote, that women need to control what is below their belly button but not men, that he regards himself as a Nazi, on and on and on, none of it bothered MAGA? The news is apparently so ghastly Republican Party of NC is urging him to drop out today, which is the last day to withdraw. They cannot get him off the ballot, regardless, because that deadline passed.
please come back and let us know what it is!!!!!
but, would the NC GOP simply concede the race to the Dems or be able to swap out Robinson for someone else????
My guess would be that they would be begging people to write in a particular name. They might have some sort of caucus to arrive at that name, but I don't know of another route.
Thank you Jay.
I'm hoping that the people across the country are taking the vile racism and lies seriously and understanding that the GQP scumwads are showing their true colors and need to be VOTED OUT.
Cheetolini and CouchF*ck McGee (Jeff T's name for him) need to be called out for their cowardly domestic terrorism and mocked for avoiding discussion of anything of substance. The Haitian communities in places like Florida will hopefully be motivated to turn out to vote in massive numbers and vote not only for Harris/Walz, but for the rest of the Dems all the way down the ballot.
A remarkable piece because it could easily be 10 separate posts, and it has astonishingly little repetition. Expertly done. Optimism, yes. I am very optimistic. But as we soccer fans say, "two-nil is the most dangerous lead in sports." Staying disciplined and diligent will win the game.
I feel like we need Gold Five in our ears saying "stay on target... stay on target..."
Thank you so much for writing this! Your first piece with cautious optimism realy helped me feel there was still hope for Democrats.
Now that we're all subject to "poller-coaster" mood swings this is nice as well.
I'm doing postcards to voters for North Carolina, hoping my efforts will contribute to a win for Harris
I love "poller-coasters!"
I always get annoyed when people bring out that old chestnut about which candidate you’d want to have a beer with, but there might be something to it this time, because part of what makes Harris and Walz appealing is that they seem NORMAL. We are so, so tired of the MAGA weirdness, of people carrying fake sperm in cups and talking about foreigners eating our pets and screaming about drag queens and all the rest of it. Harris and Walz have identifiable facial expressions; they can make friendly jokes; I can imagine asking one of them for directions. We have been wandering in the desert for nine years and these totally ordinary human qualities are like a pool of clear water. Normality, decency, competence: I want to jump into them and paddle around.
Thank you Jay for a nice dose
of cautious optimisim.
Its only the polls saying that its a close race. I don't think its close at all and suspect Harris will win by a large landslide, along with several other Democrats in what the polls are calling"tight" races.
I suspect Big media and their Billionaire owners are promoting a false narrative that the race is tight (and sometimes even that Trump is leading like they were a few weeks ago) in an attempt to "fair and balance" the corporate tax cutters into victory. I simply refuse to believe these polls, period.
Its the Turnout, Stupid. All of the registered voters especially the ones who are of the Taylor Swift crowd will make a huge difference. Also, they are not going to buy into October Surprises such as possible laptop emails and other bullshit. If anything, the October surprise will be Trump's sudden incarceration or the news that he and Laura Loomer are expecting.
Elan Musk can go eff himself as everyone recognizes that he is a James Bond -class villain. His Starlink Satellites are burning up and spreading fine alumina dust in the same atmospheric layers where protective Ozone is created. This dust is reducing the Ozone so lather up in sunscreen everyone. Unfortunately, the trees and other organisms cannot do this and this is further stressing the satellites. He is simply launching these satellites to justify the privatization of Space. Wear your sunscreen everyone and kiss the Biosphere goodbye.
Hopefully he and Trump will launch off to Mars soon, or go down to the Titanic in a fiberglass submarine. And there is that saying: Third time's a Charm.
OMG I LOVE the "he and Laura Loomer are expecting" as an October surprise!!!!
I mean, now I can't get that image out of my head, but I still love it.
Genocide supporters have no right to be in office.
Sigh. There’s more than a single issue in this election.
Do you honestly think a second Trump administration would be better for the innocents in Gaza? Trump, who finds a corrupt “partner” in Netanyahu, would do *anything* Bibi asked him to do, and I can *guarantee* you that would not be good for Palestinian civilians, who are unfortunately bearing the brunt of Israel’s attacks of claimed self-defense.
Just like Trump running to stay out of prison, Netanyahu is maintaining the “war efforts” as a way to deflect from his own felonious conduct. A Trump presidency would give Bibi everything he needs to maintain that war and stay out of prison himself.
I find it hard to believe that you can’t see this clearly.
Who is committing Genocide? Israel? Both candidates support Israel. So how does that work?
It seems everyone is forgetting Taylor Swift’s first encouragement to vote. I’m not sure of the exact number, but it was around 367,000 new registrations. Add that to the 406,000 this round and you get almost 800,000 new voters. That enough to swing the election in Harris’ favor. In addition, Billie Eilish has also encouraged her fans to register and vote. Not only are a majority of these new voters young women, they are likely to vote for Harris because of reproductive rights and climate change, which will impact their lives more than any other issue.
Altogether, unless something major occurs (pray God it doesn’t), it’s looking very good for the Harris/Walz ticket.